“We hiked about a mile across six feet of ice in Admiralty Sound with the intention of photographing a small Adelie penguin rookery. Close by was a small group of Weddell seals, sleeping near to their breathing hole.

True to form, the seals noisely slept on their sides. Eventually, one woke up, lifted its head and peered over at me curiously. I fired off a few frames thinking he would go back to sleep. But instead, he lifted his head and hind flippers high off the ground in a long graceful stretch, before finally rolling over and falling back asleep.”

Laysan Albatross on Midway Atoll

I uploaded an initial batch of photographs from my recent trip to Midway Atoll. You can access them through my Galleries page or directly via this link.

Here is a YouTube link to two Laysan Albatross doing their dance on Midway Atoll.

Here is a YouTube link to a whole field of Laysan Albatross on Midway Atoll.

Here is a YouTube link to two Black-footed Albatross doing their dance on Midway Atoll.

Rotating Rubber caps on the Nikon D3/D3x

The Ten-pin remote and flash sync terminals on the Nikon D3/D3x have rubber caps that are attached to the camera. This is a big improvement over the small screw caps that were on previous models. However, I found that the rubber caps would sometimes get in the way when attaching remote cords. The other day, I was attaching a remote, and had a moment of clarity. The rubber caps actually rotate, so you can move them out of the way. This is shown in the photo. It’s only taken me a 18 months of using the camera to find this neat feature!

Two images demonstrating the difference in angle of view when using long and short lenses

I recently spent a week at Midway Atoll; this is located about 3200 miles west of my home town of San Francisco. To say that this is an incredible location to photograph birds is an understatement. It is the equivalent of St. Andrews Bay on South Georgia, with endless opportunities. Both locations allow you to use your range of focal lengths, from long to really wide. The images on the left show the possibilities. I was photographing the pair of Black-footed Albatross with a 14-24mm. Joe Van Os asked me to hold the pose whilst he photographed me with a 500mm lens with the Albatross in the foreground. Whilst “modeling”, I snapped a few images of him, showing the picture from my perspective. Everybody has a favorite lens, but you should remember to shoot with various focal lenses so that your images show different points of view.

Pelican 1550 with Nikon D3 and D2x

Sometimes when traveling via air, it’s necessary to put your equipment in checked luggage. This all depends on which airline you are traveling with and their carry on restrictions. One of the most trusted storage options are Pelican cases.   Choosing which case is suitable for your needs is often a hard choice. One of the best options is to take your equipment down to your local camera store and try them out. It’s amazing how a case which on paper seems large suddenly shrinks in size when you start putting your gear in. I find the padded dividers work best for me as it allows me to reconfigure the case as needed.

One of the key things to consider is the internal height of the case. This is especially important if you have one of the “pro” bodies that have an integrated vertical grip. A large number of cases that on paper look fine will not work when you try to put a Nikon D3/D3x in them. The reason being is their interior height is much too short, making it impossible to shut the case lid! The photo shows a Pelican 1550 case with a D3 on the left and a D2x on the right; this case has an interior height of 7.62″. You can see that this case is the minimum height that allows you to store the camera upright. Cases such as the 1450 and 1500 do not have sufficient interior height (6″ and 6.93″ respectively). You would have to lay the camera down flat with these cases, hence consuming precious space.

A king Penguin and Antarctic Fur Seal with the M/V Ushuaia

Last week on Thursday 4th December, the MV Ushuaia grounded in the Antarctic Peninsula. Luckily, nobody was hurt and all the passengers have been taken safely off the ship. Full details can be found at the IAATO website  (see the press release section). We sailed on the M/V Ushuaia on our trip to the Falkland Islands, South Georgia Island and Antarctica back in January 2008. The ship has a great crew and we wish them well. One of the photographs I took on that trip is shown on the left, with the M/V Ushuaia on the horizon with a King Penguin and Antarctic Fur seal in the foreground.

Country Road

Images from our 3.5 day trip to Northern Ireland are now online. We had a great time travelling with a friend. Although we had typical weather… two days of rain and one good day, the scenery and people were “grand”. Next time we’ll plan a longer trip so that we can cover Ireland. I’m still processing some of the images, so more may be added in the future. You can access the photos via the Galleries tab or directly using this link.

The last rays of light hit a cactus and Elephant tree growing in the lava flow of the Tres Virgenes

Photographs from our trip to Baja California Sur, Mexico, are now online. This trip included photographing California Gray whales. You can access the photographs via the Galleries tab or directly using this link.

Keeble & Shuchat Photography

290 California Avenue

Palo Alto

CA 94306

Here’s a map

Launch of STS-126

On Friday November 14th, we were lucky enough to watch the night launch of the Endeavour space shuttle from the Causeway at the Kennedy Space Center. This was pretty amazing to say the least and was quite challenging to photograph. The cropped image shows the launch, just as the shuttle cleared the tower. The orginal photograph was taken in portrait orientation, with my D3, 200-400 with 1.4 teleconverter, ISO 800, 1/125 sec @ f11. The causeway is about 6.5-7 miles from the launch pad. I”ll be posting an article on my experiences photographing the night launch in the near future.